Overheard: Audrey? Is that you?

So we were just sitting here in the living room about thirty minutes ago, both clickety-clicking away on our laptops, having long, long since dispensed with the children, when we heard a weird calling on the baby monitor. A child's voice, from a distance. It sounds... like Audrey... but it's not coming from her room. She's... somewhere else in the house? We went upstairs to find her quite happily sitting in the guest bedroom (in a seriously, hideously soiled diaper, it turns out) and just as pleased as punch to see us.

"Audrey, what are you doing in here?" I asked, genuinely interested to see if she could explain it. "I was hiding in here! Like a sleeping pig!" she reported. "How long have you been in here?" I asked, since it was past ten and almost two hours since we put her to bed. "Well," she said, turning her palms up and shrugging, "thirty-nine."

Calvin in stripey PJs, and an explanation about printers

Calvin can now sit up completely on his own, for long stretches of time, and when he stops sitting it's not because he has toppled backwards (although in moments of extreme excitement this can still happen) but because he has gone into Almost Crawling mode, on all fours, in order to reach for something.

Slow down, my little son! You grow up too fast!

And I hope you will enjoy this Overheard, from Scott. I caught it while eavesdropping on Audrey and Scott cleaning up in the "library," which is the boneyard for our obsolete electronics and unwanted books.

Audrey: (pointing to defunct printer) Why does it not work anymore?

Scott: Well, see, it wasn't working and Daddy tried to fix it and make it work again and he.... broke it some more.

Well said, Mr. Eleven-years-of-MIT-education.

Scott and the kids on a rainy Saturday

There's always room for one more in the glider rocker... except when there isn't and someone falls out.

Overheard: The give-ded

Me: I see you have one of Daddy's business cards there. Did he give that to you?

Audrey: No, I just give-ded it to myself.

This is how she constructs the past tense: not I fell but I fall-ded. Not I ate but I ate-ed. Not-- and I'm sorry to say this one still comes up fair amount-- I peed over there, but I peed-ed.

Overheard: Soapy Helper

A little bit of toddler language tossed salad:

Audrey was so pleased that I praised her for setting the soap back into the soap dish after she washed her hands that she said, "Thank you, Mommy. You the best soapy helper ever after in the whole wide world!"

So there!

Observed: Give him the blue ribbon!

Calvin can't say anything yet, but I'll give him a column of his own for observations. Such as this:

Today while I was feeding him for the umpteenth time I thought, this kid eats like he's a contestant in a pie-eating contest. Like the returning champion pie-eater, confident of another win, but showing off to impress the crowd. He eats with such gusto, and then every once in a while he takes a break to tip his head back and give me this huge, crazy grin and smack his lips-- Victory is in sight!-- and then he gives me a double thumbs up.

Okay, the last detail is just embellishment. You get the idea. The boy likes his food. He weighs as much now as Audrey did when she was a year old, and is wearing pajamas she outgrew, it seems, just a few months ago. Last week, she borrowed his swim trunks and they fit fine. And he's not even eating solids yet; we tried him on some baby cereal recently, expecting another day of pie-eating at the fair, but he clamped his mouth shut and refused. So we'll wait another couple of weeks and see if he changes his mind.

Move over, Audrey-- I ride up front, now.

Calvin's good will campaign is aided by his new ability to ride in the front of the grocery cart. Also easier: sampling leafy green produce and grabbing handbags of passers-by.

She comes by it honestly, I guess

Old block.

Chip.

What goes without saying

While making plans with a friend for a late after-the-kids-are-in-bed dinner over e-mail, I footnoted that my plans only had about 80% certainty, because of Scott's work and the possibility of someone getting sick, etc. My friend reminded me that this hardly needs to be underlined between the parents of young children. Of course plans may be dashed at any time. Spelling it out is kind of like saying, "I'll meet you for coffee, unless it rains or I get into a wreck or I spontaneously combust on the way there."

Here is a picture of Calvin, who doesn't get as many pictures on the blog because secretly (ha! the secrecy of a blog!) I am sympathetic to my older child's fear of being overshadowed. Calvin's wearing socks on his hands a lot of the time lately to prevent him from scratching at his allergy-irriated skin, but we try to give him "free hands" time to practice handling toys and pulling our hair and pinching us. His grip is powerful: the other day he nearly took off Scott's eyelid.